launch amaro washington d.c. here's what's coming up tonight on the big picture who has the real policymaking power in washington congress or billionaire back hard right thing to that and more in tonight's big picture rubble and it's a nice daily take new information is out surrounding the deaths of one hundred twelve workers at a bangladeshi clothing factory last but what my name blowing decision did wal-mart officials make what kind of punishment should they be facing as a result. it's

friday you ready to join me for tonight's big picture rubble are marc harrold libertarian comment commentator attorney and author sam sachs progressive progressive commentator contributors truthout dot org and horace cooper conservative commentator and senior fellow at the national center for public policy research which is such an official sounding name for us to indeed i'm sure ok let's start with michigan late yesterday at the instruction of governor rick snyder and funded astroturf groups americans for prosperity in american legislative exchange council the michigan state house and senate passed a controversial right to work for us law eight people were arrested outside the capitol staters expect to sign a law next week but just as a fact just to do to put this into context and right to work for less states the average wage is fifty three hundred dollars a year less. twenty one percent more people lack health insurance and right to work for less states and fifty one there are fifty four percent more workplace deaths and injuries how can republicans try to get the rust belt vote the worker vote the

average working class vote when this is what they're trying to impose on americans or us well. it's not about what the republicans are going to do it's about what's good for the economy what's good for those states what you didn't mention is on average those states have a lower unemployment number what is most likely the case in those states as well is that the growth in those particular states the economic growth is also stronger and by the way the workers the union workers say is that universally right to work for less states have lower unemployment i mean the they tend to i figure they do but one last point. you know workers there only have the u.a.w. and the other unions to blame for this this is the home of big union and if they could lose their that's the evidence of the people who know them best know that worst well it might be the home of big union but it's also right now controlled by a republican state legislature a republican governor which is and they're forcing this law throughout the behest of americans for prosperity in kokoda groups and there are huge protests

confronting the passage of this law as you mentioned the stats five thousand dollars less every year twenty one percent fewer people on health on health today health benefits and more workplace in other words higher corporate profits here let's go bust because the workers more money gets cut by c.e.o.'s and if you look at the right to work states they're all southern states they're all the same states that are collecting a lot more money from the government and they're paying into the government because people have to go on benefits right there people have to go on government benefits because their employer isn't paying them enough to get by so mark well first of all this idea that you're going to lose the rust belt if you lose unions you saw they tried to amend the michigan constitution they had the concept proposition two it failed i think fifty seven percent voted against it i think there's other reasons people who are in unions i think guns is a big issue the democrats fail on with union voters in the rust belt they're not just single issue voters just unions but you know this is one of those things that at first looks like a very libertarian thing you don't want people have to pay association only into associations that they don't want to join but really when you look even deeper into

it you're still at the core of this and people disagree i've been on this all day looking and libertarians are all over the place but at the end of the day you're still talking about the governor. passing a law to get in the way of a contract between unions and their employers that was going to favor right to work laws i think they have every right to pass and i don't favor that was the argument that the supreme court made back in one thousand nine hundred eighteen when they said that there that it was illegal for the united states to pass a law saying that you couldn't employ a ten year old yeah well it's of do to some degree after a member of the federal law would the contract clause the constitution would be more involved than a state law because the state constitution to be different the federal constitution so different on that point that you know say in the labor unions can exist in a state and that they can require everybody who is benefiting from the union to pay dues into the union which is essentially what you know what this piece of taft hartley was all about this right to work for less is that people people get to be motors basically if they get to work in a way union workplace they get all the benefits of the union contract but they they can choose whether or not to pay dues in the union and enough people decide to be

free loaders that eventually the union starve i mean that's that's the whole thing so i mean if enough people didn't join them they starve themselves out they themselves are from the inside of us or all i'm saying is i can see why people like a lot of people don't like the law but the idea that it's just an association all right you have to remember too that it's still a law that gets in the way of a contract between an economic mechanism in the form of tang there are hundreds of thousands of laws that get those you know we have contracts in the laws they say look at each one of them and see where they're going to benefit contract to do all kinds of you know you can contract to take out a hit on say i don't see. a way out of my own i am already well obviously we can't answer we would i mean there when it's right and it's ok that's the point here again though is the unions only have themselves to blame for this this is the heart of a huge applause for all the unions or if we have eight percent unionization in the united states they will while they had their dominance when they had their down but they still had a class no they didn't they started off with preventing minorities and women from

being able to be active participants you know so when they try to recover when they try to improve. what they have is a residue of a great institution in america one time unfortunately it was the case but i would advise you know your party to keep going after unions because it works so well for me after the two thousand and ten election when they went after unions in michigan and they went out in ohio and in wisconsin and all those states voted overwhelmingly for president obama thanks to the union vote so yeah if you want to lose working people for the actually probably last word again as i said it's not about who wins or loses the elections it's about what's good for the country what's good for economic growth and in terms of economic growth the unions have been a parasite that have cost more than they've benefited and that's the precisely the reason this is why you have what you call moochers people who sit there and say it's not benefiting me i don't want to contribute to it no it is benefiting me i don't want to contribute as a c.e.o. making four hundred times more than his worker makes good for the economy good for america that's called freedom because people get to decide what it is that they

want to have homeowners there are a lot of their workers have a there that say how about a rule that says you must pay your c.e.o. four hundred times this is what unions want to get in the business of doing dictating those kinds of terms while they actually what it's called it's called negotiating those kinds of terms and you're right the unions are democracies in the workplace and they're people saying you know we would like to have some say in how this workplace is run and what's wrong with that i mean are there are you would add libertarian dictatorships which is a workplace you know not the layout of the challenger indicator ships the leadership of these organizations are totalitarian dictators they are lying to you they have a story right julio led a life that is completely different to that and i feel that they are like about their shareholders at exxon mobil or something i don't see that you're talking about workers teachers or any type of did not know what the union leadership i'm not only union leadership they are not at all like they are members hater ship that

terrorizes most of their how many dictators just want to dictators are elected by their people i can say this only the c.e.o.'s elect. by the shareholders of a company there's a democratic both management and the union workers can be seen as democratic entities if there's an election process going on we can say there's things that get in the way of pure democracy but the bottom line is you also have shareholders in the shareholder dividends of what comes back to them and they have the point if they want to pay their c.e.o. that much money c.e.o.'s got to be worth it and here they think it is but i'm not going to government out of those ideas and here's the title question goons that go around to tea party events and beat up people here who isn't that here in this case the elected leadership give me a break here so here's the fundamental question whose rights are more important the rights of the shareholders of the rights of the workers is not really what it comes to equally important or equal and if you're really in here and if you have an ira where i have a voice must remember that a union a fundamental right of workers to decide whether or not they wish to give money but i'm terribly organization and if they have equal rights and the shareholders have

the right to collectively vote the policies of the corporation inside of the c.e.o. is not one tear through through a well it's voluntarily but it's but there is a legal structure for it's called the corporation so why shouldn't there be a legal structure for the workers are used in the corporation is a voluntary association in the workplace it's a voluntary association people who are conscripted the go to work over at g.m. let's face it when you have an economy where three or four people are looking for every one job opening in america you pretty much are forced in whatever job you have right now we don't exactly have a robust economy or people can just go with plus they have their health insurance tied to where they work and there's a little bit of a large city they can think you can use for that problem oh or that or that benefit that they have that they at least still have health insurance yes to a tea party stalwart jim de mint ok that's it i'm outta here he's giving up the last two years of his senate seat to go to the heritage foundation because he says he'll have more power there more influence should any think tank the left wing right wing whatever be in a position of more power than

a united states senator mark one of the more power the united states senator he must think he my guess is it's money he thinks in that position he can do more. things he wants to tell you in a million dollar your paycheck you look at a million years and that's that's the job you've got the think tank has the money the resources they have because somebody is interested in propelling those views that's fine and i was surprised that he decided to do this but there's nothing really wrong with this i you know if he wants to go and do this i don't think this really shows that the think tank has more power than the entire united states senate may think saying that one senator feels he can do more and i think then that the deadlock the legislating samant the gentleman just thought that this is probably the end of his career he's not going to successfully run for reelection in two years he was always getting the good i think there is extremely afraid of losing alvin greene next time around all her election i think i think. and he does and he doesn't have to worry about a tea party you know i didn't i don't know he is doing it probably for the money he's going to make a million bucks going there but i think the point you're making about organizations being more powerful than the senate i think there's an argument to be made there

and this goes back thirty years when business america decided they want to start spending a lot of money and think tanks and lobbying congress and we can make a lot of profits doing that and that's what they've done and now you have this network of think tanks constantly turning out t.v. commercials papers. ultimately dismiss is morris to a large extent this is the only water at lee atwater strategy at work the refs of become the ones who define the terms of debate in america. i just go and look at what a strategy but this is nothing like that however i'm fine with the heritage foundation or any organization being quote more powerful than government because the government should not be the most important most significant influence that happens in our lives but but should be in a visual activity of people that's what should be well you'd better get out and start to this senator we should so we're saying that you as an individual should be more powerful than the government certainly certainly their responsibility should be you know as an individual should be more powerful than any corporation in

america certainly the individual tell me how that works the individuals ought to be the primary liberty. interests that we are promoting and here you are in a number of ways but are you trying to lay all of us i am ranting of there's no such thing as society let's go back to the question of him mr de mint ought to be applauded and the reason he ought to be applauded is he doesn't want to make a lifetime career out of serving as a politician and still on the government dole he said he would serve two terms and not only did he keep his word he stays late like sarah palin did he screams quitting like they're failing is a term getting i get you know i get it it's good to get the money i think is remarkable the only way that you get you progressives think people should operate is as long as they are in government it's better i'm saying you live in government you haven't heard me condemn jim de mint for taking. my money i find it fascinating suspicious well you know actually that's one of the one of the things that i'm reading in in the right wing blogs is that jim de mint was an audible guy because he was one of the poorest of the u.s.

senators he has a net worth of forty thousand bucks why not take any and we will be back with more of tonight's big picture rubble right after the break. here is mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that many americans call a dollar. i'm sorry i'm just a guy who cares an awful lot about you sir are a fool you know what that is my terrorist cells in your neighborhood want to give us aid to feature isn't a liberal the christian apologist can secure the borders but. you know the corporate media distracts us from what you and i should care about because they're profit driven industry that sells us sensationalistic garbage because that breaking news i'm having martin and we're going to break that.

you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom hartman welcome to the big picture. the first.

back to big picture rubble joining me tonight marc harrold sam sachs horace cooper let's get back to it senator dems are getting ready to pass legislation giving the president the ability to raise the debt ceiling there's a fundamental misunderstanding i think in america about the debt ceiling and i'm i'm just frankly astounded that the republicans are demagoguing this thing or whatever maybe that's the wrong word or too strong a word but. i only heard over and over again i hear people say the president wants to raise the debt ceiling so he can spend more money the debt ceiling has nothing to do is spending money on the president doesn't have the authority to spend money the debt ceiling has to do with paying off the bills that congress already ran up only congress can appropriate funds only congress can pay those funds off by raising taxes raising the debt ceiling and this is i think why for ever the debt

ceiling has been a routine vote until until they just decided to hold it hostage get to the senate minority leader mitch mcconnell he said by demanding the power to raise the debt limit whenever he by as much as he wants president obama showed he's really what he's really after is assuming unprecedented powers to spend taxpayer dollars without any limit this is simply not true mark you know it's in there this is the debt ceiling has become the last big strategy that the g.o.p. has to some degree to try to show that they're really trying to do something here and they're kind of holding the debt ceiling hostage because most people like you said don't understand it has more to do with paying off what you've already done in fact you can come in you could have every incoming kicked out and the new congress would still need to some degree to raise the debt ceiling to pay off what they had done i mean depending on what they did so the debt ceiling this is become very ideological i think some people see this step going off this fiscal cliff as being able to win a small battle and maybe later to be able after the midterms to win the war i think people really feel they sent people to washington to spend less money they're not

going to do it if they raise the debt ceiling if that sounds like spending money and the g.o.p. is really to try to both parties have in the past but the g.o.p. this time they mischaracterize well. that means and i think a lot of people don't understand it their whole strategy depends on low information voters when it comes to the limits and people not understanding what it means and really where mcconnell's really are doing is raising the debt ceiling he's not preventing president over spending money he's basically saying america should become a deadbeat nation and not pay our bills and i think the white house made a big mistake yesterday when carney said we've taken the fourteenth amendment option off the table because if the republicans want to play games with the debt ceiling and question the credit of the united states which it was in direct contradiction of the fourteenth amendment the president should just say ok guys i'm just going to do it on my own and you can fight me in the courts if you want to or as low information voters you guys are the king of low information voters who's the obama phone queen out there you guys are you already mentioned that doesn't exist to these people all the time because one group of americans believe that we shouldn't keep extending the credit card and allowing ourselves to purchase is not

only going to pay you know have a credible or at least we absolutely has a little women are spend over the should not extend the limit if we're not going to take a look at whether or not going forward we're going to continue this level of spending it is sustain there they're all related it is no it's not unrelated rays you have to have a lens we're going to pay off hash and you have leverage there is no conversation happening in this administration to actually deal with the spending crisis our nation takes and if you are in a have a we have a revenue crisis not a spending christmas absolute spending well you know revenue as a as a percentage of g.d.p. as where it was in one nine hundred fifty we have and spending as a as a percentage of g.d.p. is unprecedented last question quick forgive me it's given that washington's new marijuana legalization law washington state went into effect this week i'm sure everyone on the panel has already booked your pointer gets to visit the state so

the question if you live in a state or district where recreational pot was legal how would you prefer your pot brownies rolled mark never been my thing i wouldn't get out there and do it i think see. police to their credit are laying off and not going to enforce it even in public for a short time let people get used to it i think it's great that they did it it's not my thing so i wouldn't go out there and smoke with more power to him sam. i have no idea what that term means and i have like mark it's not my thing as well but i am curious those states get to do it arizona trust do immigration that the feds come out against it a lot of hypocrisy here and. you know i'll confess it was my thing when i was a teenager but it's been a lead it's been a lot of years but basically i'll try whatever this guy is if i leave the state was live ok marc harrold. you want to explain the law that explains what. i know or care you should just read ok thank you and thank you all for being with you.

we now know that the death of one hundred twelve workers of the garment factory in bangladesh just like the deaths of countless others around the world and right here in america is the result of a cost benefit analysis this one was apparently largely done by wal-mart although that practice is common across the corporate world before the fire wal-mart was well aware of the dangerous conditions at the tasmanian factory in two thousand and eleven the retail giant audited that factory giving it a high risk rating a second audit several months later found similar ira safety hazards and the factory was then barred from producing clothes for wal-mart in the future yet has remained which so i'd say fire safety certification expire in june of this year and was currently building a ninth floor on a factory that was only authorized to have three floors continued making garments

for won't wal-mart is the largest purchaser of merchandise in bangladesh using through third parties cheap labor there just like they're busy. model depends on cheap labor here in the united states and according to documents obtained by bloomberg news wal-mart and other retailers like gap and target were directly notified in april of two thousand and eleven of the numerous safety hazards at factories they were using in bangladesh during a meeting in bangladesh is capital dhaka the retailers were specifically asked to pay slightly higher costs per garment so that the factories could make some much needed upgrades and safety improvements representatives from wal-mart and gap responded to the request by saying specifically to the issue of any corrections on electrical and fire safety we are talking about forty five hundred factories in a most cases very extensive and costly modifications would need to be undertaken to some factories they added in this document it is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments wal-mart collected more revenue than any other

corporation in america in two thousand and eleven and ranked in the top five in total profits bringing in a whopping sixteen four point four billion dollars in profits last year but they were willing to spend a penny of that massive profit to protect their wage slaves in bangladesh from dying in a fire that was so very very likely to happen these documents that have just been released suggest that wal-mart concluded that extra investments and safety in bangladesh would not be as profitable for the company as a result the families of one hundred twelve workers in bangladesh are in mourning. but this isn't surprising since corporate america has played this hand before nine hundred seventy nine hundred seventy three in two thousand and nine as many as two thousand people were killed right here in the united states when their g.m. trucks crashed and their gas tanks exploded on impact and investigation by the national traffic traffic safety administration concluded that the problem had to do

with sidesaddle gas tanks that were newly installed on g.m. trucks beginning in one thousand nine hundred seventy three to increase the fuel capacity those gas tanks now located on the outside of the truck are more likely to be damaged in an accident and could more easily explode when g.m. didn't initiate a recall instead g.m. asked one of its engineers edward i.v. to run a cost benefit analysis to determine which would be more profitable to the company to recall fixing the new gas tanks were simply paying out settlements to victims and their families the fixing the gas tanks would cost about eight dollars and fifty nine cents per vehicle g.m. could have moved the dangerous tank of gas tanks to a safer location the car for that amount but either you concluded the paying out settlements to the five hundred or so people who would have died every year when their gas tanks exploded would only cost g.m. two dollars and forty cents of the vehicle so nine hundred seventy three g.m.

abandon plans to make the gas tanks safer embracing profits over safety and condemning thousands literally thousands of americans to an agonizing death when there's a foreign oil giant b.p. in two thousand and five a b.p. refinery in texas city exploded killing fifteen workers who were nearby trailers as reported by the baylor daily beast and newsweek the lead attorneys representing the families of the workers killed who were killed discovered that b.p. had run a quasi benefit analysis in two thousand and two to determine what material they should use to most cheaply build the trailers that surrounded the oil refinery. rather than using more expensive blast resistant material that would have most likely saved the lives of those who were killed b.p. opted for the more profitable and less safe alternative because should an accident occur b.p. would actually save money paying out settlements to the dead rather than building blast resistant trailers of b.p.'s own calculations the life of

a worker is valued at ten million dollars and many assume the two thousand and ten b.p. gulf oil explosion spill that killed eleven workers was also the result of a cost benefit analysis performs somewhere in b.p.'s headquarters so how much longer are we going to let corporate america get away with this deadly number crunching when g.m. is immoral cost benefit analysis was exposed a los angeles jury awarded victims of the exploding gas tanks and a mind boggling four point nine billion dollars civil verdict back in one thousand nine hundred ninety more than a decade later when b.p.'s corporate malfeasance behind the gulf oil spill was exposed a corporation was hit by the biggest criminal fine in the history of the company four point five billion not only that b.p. was barred from the e.p.a. from receiving any new federal contracts and barred by the department of interior receiving any new leases to drill for oil in public lands. in response to this latest factory fire in bangladesh we should be demanding similar punishments for

wal-mart if b.p. is banned from drilling any new holes in the ground to suck up oil for its role in killing eleven human beings and wal-mart should be banned from opening up any new stores in the united states for its role in the death of one hundred twelve bangladeshis. since we claim to set a moral example for the rest of the world and we shouldn't discriminate between the deaths of white americans and brown bangladeshis only harsh consequences are going to force these corporations to put safety first and profit second if walmart and the other retail giants in america know that they'll be hurt the next time they let a factory in the third world go up in flames then there will be an industry wide rethink of those precious cost benefit analysis and just maybe they'll bring some of those jobs back to america. up next we'll speak with veteran journalist christian freeland for this week's conversations with great minds.

you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then something else you hear sees some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom hartman welcome to the big picture. worst. white house to give a. radio guy for a minute. quote if you've never seen anything like that.

you google you. tube the right conversations with great minds i'm joined by christian freeling christian is currently the editor of time.